Our Annual Picnic

President's Message

Hello to our website visitors. The San Diego Prowlers are now well into our 71st year. It is August and it's hot even in San Diego. This was our first Summer
since the early '70s that we haven't staged our annual

"Picnic and Ol' Timers Reunion". It really feels good to relax a little and have time to drive our hot rods and maybe even work on them a little.

As promised we are reinventing ourselves back into "doing whatever we want" for a change and leave the event planning to promoters who enjoy that stuff!

We are still the unchallenged "oldest hot rod club" continuously corrupting young men since 1947 so please dig in to our webpages and visit the hot rod club that
has been there the whole time. See the men, cars and their hobby from post WWII to the present that was the laboratory of power and style that helped shape today’s automobile.

News

Johnny Vinta - Associate Prowler Member

I was born and raised in Hawaii. We came to the mainland when I was fifteen and it wasn't long before I realized people need to mobile here to make it and be cool. I needed wheels!!

My first car was a 1946 Chevy two door coupe. Bought it when I was 16. I tinkered with it and changed the engine twice and did little things to make it look different.

My second car was a 1952 Cadillac Coup de Ville which was painted Candy Gold, and lowered. I entered it in shows at the Balboa Park Electric Building and the Community Concourse. Man I
was hooked! I have since just always had a hotrod in the works and I always did my own work and and paint.

I started with a 1915 'T' bucket roadster pickup. It is now 66 years later and I'm building my last car, I swear it! It is a 1948 Custom Ford convertible that is a frame up
restoration.

In all I remember about 10 cars. Most of them I built from the frame up and painted by myself. I remember a 1925 Ford roadster, 1925 two door sedan, 1932 Ford Victoria, 1955 Ford
pickup, and a 1931 Ford Vicky.

Some of those cars were with me such a short time I barely got to know them.

One car I won't forget is the 1925 Ford Roadster that won the Oakland Roadster show....the same car I rolled at the 1969 Prowlers picnic. I took it apart and totally restored it again.

My brother-in-law drives a 1930 Ford coupe I built. My favorite toy today is a 1921 Woody delivery wagon. I got it shipped out of New Jersey and restored it. And someone in Italy
is driving around in a 1951 5-window pickup I restored.

I first joined the Prowlers in 1967. I left to work on the Alaskan pipeline in the early 70's then lived in Washington and in Oregon. We finally returned to San Diego and I have rejoined
the Prowlers in 2012. My current club car is a 1935 Ford humpback that, yes, I have rebuilt from the frame up.
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